Pesto Pasta Salad

I'm a big fan of pasta salad...for a number of reasons.  I love salad, but getting my hubby to eat salad regularly is a bit of a chore (sorry hun...but it's true!) and so this is my compromise.  I also like that a little pasta salad goes a LONG way...very good on the budget (things I will need to be mindful of, especially as our BOYS grow...they already nearly eat us out of house and home!).  With my fresh made pesto (check out the recipe!) I decided to make it a Pesto Pasta Salad this time around...here is what I did!

1 cup multi coloured rotini
1/2 cup cucumber, sliced & diced
1 cup cherry tomatoes, cut in half
1/4 cup onion
2 tablespoons pesto

Prepare the pasta according to package directions.  Drain, rinse and cool.  Pour into your serving bowl.

Wash and slice cucumbers, cherry tomatoes, and onion.  Add to serving bowl.

Add 2 tablespoons of pesto (or to taste, as you prefer) and mix well.

VERDICT:
This was a great change to our usual pasta salad!  This made enough for us for two meals, so we got to have the leftovers the next day, and it still was just as delicious!  Love the fresh vegetables, it was a nice mix with the pasta...especially those red, orange and yellow cherry tomatoes from our garden :-)

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Summertime Pasta with Tomato & Basil

My most favourite cookbook series is the Whitewater Cooks series.  A very dear friend introduced the series to me, and she has given me two of the books as gifts.  My husband bought me the other.  The recipes are great, the photos are lovely, and the books are just beautiful.  The author is from British Columbia (the province where I live) and she uses ingredients that we can easily find, even people who are from smaller towns.  It's great! 

Last summer we had an abundance of tomatoes in our garden.  Last year was a stellar tomato crop, our little garden gave us over 1500 cherry tomatoes (4 different varieties)...I stopped counting at 1500 (yes...I counted, I couldn't believe our crop!).  Everyone had a gazillion tomatoes, so I wasn't able to share our bounty as much as I would have liked.  I turned some into salsa (YUM!) and we ate a lot of salads with tomatoes.  Then I found the recipe for Summertime Pasta in the Whitewater Cooks book.  And it became an instant favourite!  Here is the recipe (it is SO EASY):

½ cup olive oil
3 garlic cloves, sliced or minced (or more if you love garlic)
2 cups cherry tomatoes cut in half
Sea salt (to taste)
Fresh pepper (to taste)
Fresh basil, chopped (to taste)
1 cup asiago cheese
1 package spaghetti or other thin pasta

In the morning, cut cherry tomatoes and chop basil, put into a large bowl. Add salt and pepper to taste (we use Epicure’s Chili Garlic Sea Salt and the 4 Pepper Blend). In a frying pan over medium low heat, heat olive oil. Add garlic to the olive oil. Cook for about a minute, just long enough to infuse the garlic and oil. Transfer oil and garlic to the bowl of tomatoes. Cover with plastic wrap and let the mixture sit at room temperature all day.

At dinnertime, cook and drain your pasta. Add the pasta to the tomato mixture and toss to combine. Serve with freshly grated asiago cheese. If you find asiago cheese too strong, try a different cheese, such as parmesan or mozzarella.

We usually serve the pasta with a grilled chicken, makes for all around nice, healthy meal.

VERDICT:
This dish is a HUGE hit in our house, and I can see it being made regularly over the next while with the tomatoes being harvested.  And it is so easy to make - start it in the morning, let it sit all day, cook up some pasta and grill some meat and dinner is done, just like that!

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Guest Post - Amber from The Confessions of a Doer Mom

HI!  I am Amber and I am glad to be guest hosting today.  You can find me at The Confessions of a Doer Mom!  I am a mom going through a big change in her life as my littlest one just started school and I am starting graduate school.  Check me out sometime!

Cowboy Pasta is one of our favorite dishes around here.  We give up meat every Lent, so I found this recipe a few years ago and it has stuck.  It is a great dish for a dinner as you can make it head and put it in your oven later.  We often bring it to potlucks as well, and people ask me for the recipe.  It is really easy.

1. Dice one large onion and one large sweet bell pepper (any color will do, I usually use green though). Saute them in a large skillet over medium hear in olive oil until them are cooked through.

2. Add one large can, (26 ounces) of rinsed and drained black beans and one small bag (12 ounces) of frozen corn.  Cook until heated through.

3. Add one can (26 ounces) of your favorite spaghetti sauce and one small jar (12 ounces) of your favorite salsa.  Mix until combined and heated through.

4. Mix in one box of shaped pasta and place in casserole pan and top with cheese.  Cheddar or a Mexican mix works well.  Bake for half an hour at 350*.

5. Enjoy!  This is a great dish by itself as it has all of the food groups in it and a name that the kids will love.  Or you can dress it up with a salad.

Let me know what you think!

Welcome!

Just passing along a WELCOME to all of you joining me through my new monthly blog at Okanagan4Kids, called Adventures in Cooking.  I hope you enjoy this month's post and recipe for Summertime Tomato & Basil Pasta. 

I invite you to follow me here at Addicted to Recipes, by joining this site via the button on the left.  And feel free to take a look around at all the recipes posted so far, hopefully some will catch your eye! 

Thank you for stopping by, and please come back soon!